Profile for iamdangoodman

Whatever happens from here, I will never forget the gift this show and these artists have given me. I wish for them all the success in the world. But for me they've already become a memory of a lifetime, something so important and personal I have no words, and no amount of other people's words can burnish or diminish it for me. Thank you Next to Normal. May you get back everything you've given out.

Oh. Hunh. Does it make it more expensive to use the real understudies or something? Like they have to pay them more if they appear than if they don't? Cuz aren't they there anyway?

It is scary how deeply I feel Dan's dependence, and it actually causes me to step back and look at myself more closely. This is not to suggest that such early relationships can't be healthy. I would simply highlight the fact that Dan seems willing to do anything to help and keep Diane EXCEPT share her grief, something he might have an easier time of if his world wasn't so centered on his wife. Certainly her absence, however short, long or everlasting, shall help him develop as an individual. ...

Craww: did you think the show got less instead of better during its revisions? I only know it from Second Stage, not from NYMF or Feeling Electric and I thought it was much improved at Arena Stage. Are you thinking the opposite happened in their effort to make it better? As for the tedium of the debate, sorry. It's close to my heart so I chime in. Feel free to skip past those parts. OrangeSkittles: are you seeing the writers or the producers claiming it's about mental illness? I feel like the...

Dear Esq. It might be less of a comfort to know that the person who's agreeing with you has not actually seen it. But there are other detractors who have. You are not alone there. Hopefully there are enough people who see it and love it and spread that word, since it's swimming an uphill battle and is worthy of running. If for no other reason that it's got many people, like me, totally jazzed about Broadway who would otherwise not have spent our time or money there.

TOO LATE, BUT SPOILERS... I think there are also too many versions of the show in people's heads, in some ways. If you just go now, without the Second Stage version in your head, you come away without the same confidence that it's actually about bipolar illness, or that it's even entirely about Diana. This show is really about the family and the producers seem to know that, hence the marketing. But the chat makes it seem like it's all about Diana, which it was at Second Stage but isn't any lo...

I have the same question as Kad-- IS she diagnosed as bipolar in the timeframe of this show? She WAS diagnosed that and she says "that didn't quite seem to cover it". But does Dr. Madden, who we have to assume becomes the doctor of record here, ever say that's what she has? Maybe I just block that out so I can have my own fantasy of what the show's about.

Is that story about the young people who went out and threw their meds out a story that results from seeing this show or the Arena show? That story comes from criticism of the show at Second Stage, as far as I can tell. And leaving aside the question of whether it is true (I'll assume it is and that it was a dangerous and scary time for them when they did that), it is part of what the writers went to work on it seems. They've removed all that smart alecky stuff about meds and treatments and a...

Deep breath everyone. Sporkgoddess, it will be interesting to hear your views when you have seen the show. As JG says, it is not really possible to diagnose the play from the CD. You'd surely want to meet your client before you pronounced yourself certain, yes? There will be things in the show that alter your opinion, certainly. Like for instance, what happens between "There's a World" and the ECT. So, come back and share those things if you would. I'll be curious. For me, I am so curious why...

So, as you guys know, this show is very personal to me. And I want to weigh in on the question of 'fault' or 'feeling sorry for Dan' here. I have lived this, for over ten years, in ways strikingly similar to the show. We were married very young. We experienced a similar trauma. And we've struggled to find ourselves, our relationship, and appropriate medical support for much of the time. Here's what I know about 'fault'. It's actually a dynamic between the two of them that's at fault. They jum...

I guess it's a little late to do a SPOILER ALERT for this thread, eh? I don't know from ghosts, but I don't think the show makes a definitive statement that Diana is crazy and that's one of the things I love about it. I see him as the presence of trauma, unresolved in the family, and affecting each person in different ways. If this were Shakespeare we wouldn't be worried about one character 'seeing' a character that's not there. Or if it were any number of current plays,or a billion movies fo...

OK, so I was at a concert reading of another musical that a friend is in that was across the hall from a reading of this one. And holy s**t! The energy coming from that room was amazing. There were only a handful of us in the one I was at and I wanted to sneak out and over to this one, but since it would have been obvious to him that I wasn't there, I stayed put. But man! I caught the end of it, just from the hallway and through the wall, and it was really incredible. I have to find an excuse...

It's funny, and oddly inspiring, that this debate is back on the Board about how the timeline works. It's a puzzle that has generated a lot of conversation among people who've seen it enough to not just be sitting there stunned. I got pulled into it a few months ago, during the DC run, and I got a headache trying to put the pieces together. Finally I gave it up. The timeline makes emotional sense, even if it's challenging as a math puzzle. Maybe it's intentionally a brain buster, like the doc...

I'm late to the love fest for Robert Spencer. I liked the show 2nd Stage enough to go see it again in DC. But I fell hard for the show in DC and went back and back. And look at the handle I chose when I joined the Board so I could say how important the show had become to me. I think it's a very hard role, as I've watched it over and over (and, frankly, as I've lived it). I don't know what Brian's performance would have become had he been part of the process of the changes that happened to it ...

OMG. I can't believe it's here! Thank you for this thread. I had to leave the board because of all the negative people who were trashing something that they hadn't even seen. So glad to know it's the show I fell in love with at Arena Stage. I can't see it until next week, but I'm going to see it as much as I can afford. How do you rush? I've never done that. Point me where I can learn, if it isn't a topic for this thread. I feel like I've been holding my breath for two months. Bring on the CD...

Yahoo!! Just to echo here: * If you didn't see it at Arena Stage, you haven't seen it yet. * If Aaron wasn't going to do the run, they wouldn't have him on the cast album. Plus it's the same producer as WICKED, so this can't be a surprise to anyone involved. * I haven't seen Alison Janney (and I've got such a crush from West Wing days) but Alice Ripley's gonna be hard to beat at this point! Yes, Virginia, there is an Easter Bunny!

I know from listening to Grief in the lobby at Arena that they ARE hoping to transfer this season. AND that he knows that Tveit is going into that show. That's why I think they are aiming for now, especially if they just did the cast album with him. I think others have been told the same thing by the actors at the stage door, that they are trying to get into a theater this spring.

I'm such a rube. What makes the first post a shill, rather than just someone who really liked the show? I've written far more pushy praise for my 'crush' show. I never read this board before I saw the N2N at Arena and started following threads all over the net. Just glad nobody jumped me for chiming in!

Thanks for posting that link. I'd have missed those photos otherwise. They look like they are having a ball. I read where they are talking about the Longacre. Anyone know anything about that? I haven't seen much there but if memory serves it is a good size for these guys. Anyway, anticipation builds in my household. Fingers still crossed!

Done, JG. Ordered and patience. Thanks for showing me around this place!